Deal with the Devil: The FBI's Secret Thirty-Year Relationship with a Mafia Killer PDF
Preview Deal with the Devil: The FBI's Secret Thirty-Year Relationship with a Mafia Killer
DEDICATION To the families of Mary Bari, Patrick Porco, and the dozens of other murder victims who were killed by Gregory Scarpa Sr., or killed on his orders, during the three decades he was protected by the FBI as a Top Echelon informant EPIGRAPHS If I don’t have my money by Thursday, I’ll put him right in the fucking hospital. . . . I wanna break his mother’s face and break his fuckin’ legs and arms. 1 —Greg Scarpa Sr., recorded on a series of FBI wiretaps He told me he stopped counting at fifty [murders]. 2 —Larry Mazza, Scarpa’s protégé and co-conspirator 3 In my heart, as Scarpa’s handler, of course I knew he was doing hits. . . . A defense lawyer asked me on the stand if I admired Scarpa. I said I admired the way the man was able to conduct himself in such a treacherous environment and survive all the years he had survived without getting killed. That takes a special 4 talent. —Former FBI Supervisory Special Agent R. Lindley DeVecchio, Greg Scarpa Sr.’s contacting agent A line had been blurred. . . . He was compromised. He had lost track of who he was. —FBI Special Agent Chris Favo, DeVecchio’s number two in the FBI’s 5 Colombo Squad, on DeVecchio’s relationship with Scarpa This is the most stunning example of official corruption that I have ever seen. —Brooklyn DA Charles Hynes after indicting DeVecchio on four counts of 6 murder in 2006 relating to his alleged leaks to Scarpa I will never forgive the Brooklyn DA for irresponsibly pursuing this case. 7 —Lin DeVecchio after the dismissal of murder charges against him in 2007 What is undeniable was that in the face of the obvious menace posed by organized crime, the FBI was willing . . . to make their own deal with the devil. They gave Scarpa virtual criminal immunity . . . in return for the information, true and false, he willingly supplied. . . . Not only did the FBI shield Scarpa from prosecution for his own crimes, they also actively recruited him to participate in crimes under their direction. That a thug like Scarpa would be employed by the federal government . . . is a shocking demonstration of the government’s unacceptable willingness to employ criminality to fight crime. 8 —Judge Gustin Reichbach after the DeVecchio murder case was dismissed CONTENTS Dedication Epigraphs Introduction PART I 1 The Kiss of Death 2 A True Machiavelli 3 Hitting the Boss 4 The Special Goes South 5 Sinatra, Capote, and the Animal 6 Agent Provocateur 7 God, the Mob, and the FBI 8 Thirty Days in Forty-Two Years 9 The Octopus 10 Guns and Rabbis PART II 11 The Royal Marriage 12 Going to Hell for This 13 Love Collision 14 Twenty Grand a Week 15 Enter the Secret Service 16 Death of a Second Son 17 The Case of Cases 18 I Shot Him a Couple of Times 19 Murder on the Overpass 20 A Connection by Blood PART III 21 Rumblings of War 22 Death by Wire 23 Brains, Butcher, and Bull 24 Coup d’État 25 Pearl Harbor 26 Go Out and Kill Somebody 27 The Hit on Nicky Black 28 Closing and Reopening “34” 29 Who’s Going to Win This Thing? 30 Scarpa’s War PART IV 31 A Grain of Sand on Jones Beach 32 Expecting to Go Home 33 The OPR 34 The Dying Declaration 35 Burning a Good Cop 36 Gaspipe’s Confession 37 Insane Mad-Dog Killer 38 Organized Crime and Terrorism 39 Junior’s Second Sting 40 The Cover Up Virus PART V 41 Agent of Death 42 G-Man Sticks It to DA 43 The Son Also Rises Afterword Acknowledgments Appendix A: The Principal Figures Appendix B: The Marriage Certificate of Gregory Scarpa and Lili Dajani Appendix C: Gregory Scarpa Sr.’s Arrest Record Appendix D: June 18, 1962, Airtel to J. Edgar Hoover Debriefing of Gregory Scarpa Sr. Appendix E: The “Girlfriend 302” Appendix F: 302 from Scarpa Jr.’s Sting of Ramzi Yousef Appendix G: Ramzi Yousef’s “Kite” from the Scarpa Jr.–Yousef Sting Appendix H: Judge Reichbach’s Decision and Order Dismissing the DeVecchio Case Notes Index About the Author Also by Peter Lance Credits Copyright About the Publisher INTRODUCTION Gregory Scarpa Sr. was a study in complication. A peacock dresser, he carried a 1 wad of $5,000 in cash at all times. He wore a seven-carat pinky ring and a 2 diamond-studded watch. He made millions from drug dealing, hijackings, loan sharking, high-end jewelry scores, bank heists, and stolen securities. He owned homes in Las Vegas, Brooklyn, Florida, and Staten Island, and a co-op apartment on Manhattan’s exclusive Sutton Place. He was the biggest trafficker in stolen 3 credit cards in New York and ran an international auto theft ring. A single bank robbery by his notorious Bypass crew on the July 4 weekend in 1974 netted $15 4 million in thirteen duffel bags full of cash and jewels. His sports betting operation made $2.5 million a year. His crew grossed $70,000 weekly in drug 5 sales. And yet, fifteen years after becoming a “made” member of the Colombo crime family, when he was a senior capo, Scarpa was arrested for “pilfering” 6 coins from a pay phone. He simply couldn’t resist a chance to steal—even a handful of change from the phone company. 7 Five foot ten, two hundred and twenty pounds, Scarpa was described by one of his FBI contacting agents as “an ox of a man; like a short piano mover [with 8 a] thick neck and huge biceps.” For more than forty-two years, as a made member of the Colombo family (borgata), he roamed the streets of Brooklyn like 9 10 a feudal lord, earning the nicknames “the Grim Reaper,” “the Mad Hatter,” 11 12 “Hannibal Lecter,” and “the Killing Machine.” He even signed personal 13 letters with the initials “KM.”
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